WASHINGTON – Today, members of the Connecticut Congressional Delegation asked the United States Postal Service (USPS) for a full assessment of its consolidation plan’s impact on employees in Connecticut. The USPS’s plan – which consolidates a number of postal processing facilities, and delays mail delivery and costs jobs in order to cut operating costs – affects the processing and distribution centers in Wallingford, Stamford, and Hartford. The USPS is planning to resume this plan which began in 2012.

“We remain concerned that the closings of Area Mail Processing Centers and other facilities across the country may have an adverse impact on local and national unemployment and would further delay mail delivery for the American people. Given the importance of these facilities to communities in our state, we respectfully ask for a prompt and full accounting concerning the plan’s employee impact, as well as specific information about the implementation date and the plan’s timeline,” the delegation wrote.

The full text of the letter is below.

Mr. Ronald A. Stroman
Deputy Postmaster General
United States Postal Service
475 L’Enfant Plaza SW
Washington DC 20260-0050

Dear Mr. Stroman:

We are writing to you regarding the U.S. Postal Service’s plan to continue the implementation of its network rationalization plan. This plan will affect the Southern Connecticut Processing and Distribution Center in Wallingford, CT, the Stamford Processing and Distribution Center in Stamford, CT, and the Hartford Springfield Network Distribution Center located in Hartford, CT and Springfield, MA.

It is our understanding that the United States Postal Service will implement these changes as early as January 2015, and that said changes will be completed prior to the fall of 2015. We remain concerned that the closings of Area Mail Processing Centers and other facilities across the country may have an adverse impact on local and national unemployment and would further delay mail delivery for the American people.

We appreciate your efforts to be forthcoming about these changes. Given the importance of these facilities to communities in our state, we respectfully ask for a prompt and full accounting concerning the plan’s employee impact, as well as specific information about the implementation date and the plan’s timeline. In addition, we ask that you continue to keep our offices updated about any other developments in this matter. Thank you for your consideration of these requests.

Sincerely,

Christopher S. Murphy
United States Senator

Richard Blumenthal
United States Senator

Rosa DeLauro
Member of Congress

John Larson
Member of Congress

Jim Himes
Member of Congress